Off the Moko Moko
by Dr. Abraxas
Summary: Sesshoumaru wanted yet another sword his father commissioned. It was created after the Inu no Taisho died and it was supposed to be a gift for the enemies of the clan. Now it spells doom for Sesshoumaru! sick and twisted alert!


**"Off the Moko Moko!" by Abraxas (2008-06-20)**

It was evening when the last of the guests arrived at Lord Sesshoumaru's castle.

Jaken greeted Royakan at the gate then escorted that demon into the hall. All the while the servant apologized, with vague yet agonized verbiage, insisting it was only just a bout of unexpected seasonal discomfort that caused the break of protocol. It was not disdain that kept Lord Sesshoumaru aloof, rather, it was a concern with the well-being of those who gathered that night. Indeed, the little green youkai was adamant that no body ought to approach too close to the master.

Within the hall, a vast illuminated cosmos, the latecomer was met with bows from the rest of the assembly who were already seated. Words of respect echoed along with the sounds of sake as it poured into flasks. The demon of the forest, a shaggy, dog-like creature, saluted the others one by one while finding a place to be seated.

"Royakan!" Inuyasha said. "Over here, come, over here." Inuyasha occupied the place that used to be Lord Sesshoumaru's realm when their father hosted the event. Since he already met Royakan - unlike the others who remained strangers - he was eager to be with a familiar face so he motioned for the youkai to join his part of the table.

The forest-dweller agreed with the invitation. He sat by the half-breed then, as food was served and sake was poured, he gazed into that beyond at the end of the hall. There, amid shadow and darkness, sat the figure of Lord Sesshoumaru. The guest saluted and the host responded with a quick, sharp nod.

* * *

It was the strangest sort of truth to accept yet it could not be denied. Obvious but unspeakable - unthinkable. By whatever disease, physical or mental, the effect was devastating. The Lord of the Western Lands, at the apex of power, was reduced to mere decoration, like a display of armor, exiled at the back of the chamber, almost forgotten.

The only sign of life was that fog of breath exhaled as if it were the fire of dragons.

It fell to Jaken to commence the gathering of the clan's allies.

* * *

Lord Sesshoumaru sighed while watching the reptile conduct that ceremony. It could have been a comical spectacle - a tiny, flimsy creature corralling demons of such fierce and mighty stature - if only it were not a reflection of his own pathetic predicament. He could not hide the fact that he resented the situation. Thankfully, the cloak of ebony masked the displeasure across his face.

The worst part of the rouse was the notion of illness. He, Lord Sesshoumaru, sick? Perhaps there was a grain of truth within that lie, still, Jaken should have imagined a better type of cover. He did not know how long that condition was bound to persist. He could not rely upon that excuse again and again whenever any uncomfortable situation emerged. Eventually the world was going to suspect that something was wrong.

Yes, as a matter of fact, Lord Sesshoumaru was not well and he had not been well since that fateful day -

The problem was always that obsession with power. Power which his father wielded. Power that he demanded as birthright. His father possessed the Tetsusaiga and Tenseiga - so - he wanted those swords. Both of the swords.

It took centuries to understand the wisdom that divided the inheritance yet the thirst to be his father could not be sated by the blow to his ego that was his coming to terms with his brother.

A crueler lesson was required.

Lord Sesshoumaru seethed at the sight of Inuyasha joining the ranks of his father's allies. If only he destroyed the hanyou when he had had the chance. If only he gained both swords. Perhaps that would have quenched the thirst once and for all. But as Jaken filled his flask with water that swell of anger ebbed away. And so the truth was revealed - victory would have satisfied nothing, the need would have remained unfulfilled, the disgrace would have come sooner rather than later.

When he learned of his father's other, secret weapon, he wanted it.

Though he disapproved, he knew to be silent, he knew he could not confront the hanyou about anything. The others, with their notions of civility, were not dangerous. Only the half-breed was not afraid to get into his own private space where just the slightest thoughtless provocation would have been enough to unravel that image of Lord Sesshoumaru he wanted to portray.

Burdened by the condition, was forced to withdraw further and further away from the world.

Swilling the water as if it were potent, he wondered who he may turn to for assistance. Among all of the clan's allies somebody could be trusted. Surely, somebody was able to hold a secret. Then he rejected the notion. Not because he did not trust the demons but because he did not trust them with that information. It was the kind of knowledge meant for an intimate. Like Jaken.

Perhaps if he found a wizard, then the spell could be broken? Perhaps if motivated, then that vassal of his father could be useful? The insect knew more, much more, about the sword than he unfolded.

* * *

The evening wore on and as the sake flowed, the volume within the hall grew louder and louder. It was not usually that lively. Since his self-imposed exile, however, it was clear that the guests forgot he was present. That, itself, did not bother Lord Sesshoumaru. In fact, he wondered - if there were to be an incident it could be fashioned into an excuse to void any further reunions. At least until the condition was reversed.

He cursed, silently.

He had been so perfect. Gathering the clues. Untangling the puzzle. Forming the map. He was obsessed ever since Miyoga slipped that Inu no Taishio commissioned yet another sword.

The source to question was Totosai - the blacksmith was so afraid that Lord Sesshoumaru knew even that iota ab7out the weapon that he could not speak.

A few scattered words escaped his lips.

Its existence was a rumor. He did not forge it. He did not know who created it. It served a purpose that Inu no Taishio felt was appropriate and, though he could not fathom why, it was deposited where the enemies of the clan were certain to find it. Doubtless it was part of the Master's peculiarly warped and twisted wisdom. But the revelation that proved to be critical - and whose full weight he did not fathom until too late - was that it was completed after death.

After death.

Lord Sesshoumaru rediscovered the location of his father's climactic battle. After the passage of centuries, time would not have been kind to the evidence he needed to find. Yet it was where the story of the sword was written thus it was where the journey needed to start.

If it was forged after death, if it was hidden where enemies would have found it, then his father was not alone. He had had a discussion about the plot with its forget before that final battle. There was a conspirator who, by necessity, should have traveled everywhere with his father just in case the scheme had to be hastened.

Lord Sesshoumaru did not uncover the identity of that creature whom he fancied was a wizard of unparalleled and wicked ability. Maybe that demon was destroyed? Maybe the evil it unleashed so haunted it that it faded into oblivion?

Maybe - maybe - it touched the sword too?

Tempted by its promise of power -

Impossible!

Its creator would have known the truth was a lie.

Lord Sesshoumaru found the sword, though, amid the territory of the felines.

* * *

It was a cave, chocked by the rubble of a landslide. The breeze carried the clue. His father's scent exuded out of the rocks. As if part of the corpse were buried within the mountain.

It was not a struggle to recall the pride of the moment. Demolishing the boulders. Breaking into the passage. Running through the cavern as though he knew the way about that maze. It was as if fate aligned the moon and the stars for that very instant of victory.

He found it and it looked exactly as it was within imagination. At the back of the chamber, in front of a treasure of gold - clearly a decoy - between two burnt torches, was a statuesque display of armor. Samurai armor scared by battle. It was so out of place, so out of time. So regal. As if staged.

Yet there was the sword, erect and glorious, it trembled as though so engorged with power that it lived.

His hand grew cold as the memory of it returned.

* * *

The guests got louder and louder as the event continued.

The sounds of the voices - the speech, the laughter - thrust Lord Sesshoumaru free out of the trance. He gazed, disappointedly, at the visage of Inuyasha and Royakan reenacting a fight. Dinner was memory and thanks to the alcohol so were the rules of civility. His father would not approve but it occurred to him then and there that he did not care too much about what his father approved. No. There was a certain, sudden though not unexpected, distaste with the wishes of the Inu no Taishio.

* * *

Of course it was staged!

It was a trap and what a lure to dangle in front of the enemy!

The world already knew of the power of the Tetsusaiga and Tenseiga but to think that there was another weapon fashioned from the remains of the Inu no Taishio. Was there no limit to its power? Its mystery! The enemies of the clan should have been the prey - it was intended to capture them while they imagined the possibility of using it against his allies. The friends of the clan would have been too respectful of it, a piece of his body, to crave it against his wishes. And his sons would have been too grateful for the weapons they were endowed -

If only he fathomed its power sooner! Alas, if only he possessed the wisdom! The surest way to defeat the enemy -

"I want to be you," he confessed - nearly tearing - as he approached the sword. "Why do you deny me, father? Let me - touch you - let me - become you!"

- was to grant its very wish!

From the moment the flesh touched, demon to demon, father to son, he was struck by the curse of his own design.

He knew his father forged the Tetsusaiga and Tenseiga from his fangs but who could have imagined that other parts of the body could be fashioned into weapons?

* * *

Then he heard Jaken utter a scream.

The event transpired like a flash of lightning. Sudden. Unexpected. Yet it played out in slow motion agony as if the universe wanted to savor the moment. The large, shaggy demon, that friend of Inuyasha's, slipped as it fought a battle out of memory. It slipped, dazed and confused by the commotion of the crowd that gathered nearby. It slipped - and fell aback. Jaken struggled to run into the scan, to get between the demon and the master, but the reptile tripped and it proved to be too late to avert disaster. All the while Lord Sesshoumaru was frozen and could not help but stare, helpless, as the fiasco unfolded.

There was not as much as a raised eyebrow until Royakan landed.

"Off the Moko Moko!" Jaken shouted.

It, that contact, did not last beyond a second - the demon slid off of it and crashed atop the floor - yet fleeting it proved to be enough.

Lord Sesshoumaru trembled. Jaken urged the others out of the hall. The rest, though, were frozen while they watched the master's hair turn black, short and curly. And his head sagged and elongated. And his body contorted into a new and different shape.

* * *

Rin was plucking flowers under the moonlight. She was not bothered with the ruckus of the reunion. Dotting from bush to bush, collecting petals here and there, she was unaware of the events of the tragedy. She was far too entertained with the lei forming within her fingers to be upset by the play of adults.

That was until the moment of panic when the demons fled the castle.

She hid behind a rock and peeked along its edges to see, safely and distantly, what was happening across the courtyard.

The demons were afraid then Inuyasha and a large, scruffy dog-creature appeared laughing.

Rin was curious.

Where was Lord Sesshoumaru, anyway?

Still clutching the lei, she strolled into the hall. The lamps were lit and showed that the rest of the scene was a catastrophe of food and sake. Broken furnature. Even clumps of fabric littered the floor wherever costumes tore during the stampede. The guests could not leave fast enough but what could have scared the demons away? There did not seem to be a danger -

Except - what could it be? - a sound of trashing. A wet and sloppy sound. It was not familiar. And it came from the back of the hall.

"Lord Sesshoumaru?" she asked but there was no answer.

Jaken? Where was Jaken! Surely, he would not have left Lord Sesshoumaru. Yet even the servant did not answer.

There had to be an explanation.

The thrashing, it grew louder and violent.

As she neared she noticed a suggestion of motion. There, at the rear of the chamber, where Lord Sesshoumaru sat. Amid shadow and darkness. Something was on the floor. Something moving. Something writhing. Slithering like a snake.

She paused when she found the clothing and weaponry of Lord Sesshoumaru, stacked, piled, as if the master vanished and the articles fell atop the floor.

Just like that the armor was hit and collided across a wall of the chamber - the outfit was swatted aside by a part of that something.

It was visible at last!

Rin blinked. She did not know what to make of it. It was unlike anything she understood. Its body was rounded, like the trunk of a tree, Long and thick. A craze of veins, throbbing, winding, lent it a fearsome appearance despite its smooth and silky skin. The front end was capped by a deep dark-hued head that resembled the helmet of a samurai. A slit at its tip and ridges of flesh along its neck where its features. The back end was completed by two round masses. Coarse with clumps of hair, it seemed to be tightening and squeezing, the mounds growing more and more pronounced.

The thing, whatever it was, flopped like a fish out of water.

"No, Rin!" shouted Jaken. "You should not see that! Go, go!"

"But, but, Lord Sesshoumaru!" protested Rin.

Jaken gazed at the thing and sighed.

"Lord Sesshoumaru needs a little time to recover," he confessed. He wept into his hands. "Why did it have to be the Moko Moko? The touchable Moko Moko!"

But it did not matter what was touched and it did not matter the length of contact - at the end he was doomed to be ruined.

He should have known. No. He should have avoided it. If only ambition did not cloud reason! A sword able to grant wishes? When a wish was not meant to be granted, when the universe demanded it to be earned, it should have been a clue that it was indeed a weapon - against its wielder.

Who would have guessed the impact of a few, simple words? Just a brush, flesh to flesh, was enough to awaken the wish again and again. A wish it granted down to the last word, the final syllable: to become his own father's genitals!

**END**


End file.
